France

Laporte: 'Hopeless' ref 'robbed' us

Fri, 10 Jan 2014 08:39

Toulon coach Bernard Laporte has blasted French referee Laurent Cardona as "hopeless" and "completely incompetent" and accused him of "robbing" his team in every match, including last week's 21-22 loss to Grenoble.

Laporte stormed out of his team's Stade Mayol ground after last Saturday's Top 14 match which had seen the European champions beaten by a controversial late interception try.

Such was his rage that Laporte refused to talk to the media while club president Mourad Boudjellal even speculated that the former French national coach would not remain in the job.

On Thursday, Laporte fired both barrels at Cardona.

"He robs us every time. On the game's last move there was a strategic error, a referee error," Laporte, a former sports minister in the French government, told RMC Sport.

"It is not just this incident where he was hopeless. He was hopeless all the match. He is always hopeless."

He added: "If we continue to work in a professional environment with amateurs, it's going to be a catastrophe."

Laporte described Cardona as "completely incompetent" and said that "he had had enough", even considering resigning.

"I really wanted to quit on Saturday and I was right to leave the ground otherwise I would have been struck off for life," he explained.

"But I thought that if I left, I would be paying him too much honour. I have a contract until 2015 and I will respect it."